On Kotor

We’re in Kotor. Brilliant beautiful Kotor, nestled on the Bay of Kotor, a stunning spot with mountains disappearing straight into brilliant blue seas.

Step back.

We spent two days in Podogorica, the capital of Montenegro, taking a little side-quest out to Ostrog Monastery – a blazing white building built into the side of a cliff. It was constructed back in the 1600s, originally tucked into the cliffs as a protective measure against the Turks, but now it makes it a quiet calm sanctuary in the 38 degree heat.

The options for transport to Ostrog are a bus tour at 40 Euros per person, a train and a two hour hike (hitch-hike if you’re lucky), or Neno, a middle-aged taxi driver who spends the entire trip driving one handed and mumbling into his phone. It seems like Neno has some family drama going on, unfortunately he speaks no English, but he stays on the road and cranks the air-conditioning so we’re happy.

We arrive at the monastery to a crowd of people – there’s a long line out the front snaking down the hill, starting at the entrance gate where people are asked to dress modestly – I’ve worn full pants for the occasion, the first time in two weeks, but anyone with bare legs is given a giant monk’s smock to wear. Most people wrap them around their waist just to cover their legs, but some people put them on properly, and it feels like some sort of pre-school art convention, ill-fitting smocks for all.

Grace has told me that we’re meant to bring something to the church as an offering – last night she was pestering me to take a couple of loaves of bread from our dinner, but I was relatively sure leftover crumbs weren’t what they meant. When we get into the first part of the church it’s a tiny cave with a fresco from the 1700s across the walls and ceiling. There’s a frightening looking priest in a double smock overseeing proceedings – he waves each person in to the room quickly and points at the offering box. At this point I’m glad I’m not attempting to cram two loaves of bread into the box like a toaster. Instead I give a little bow and feign some heavy interest in the fresco above me. Grace fumbles with her wallet but I know that she doesn’t have any money in there. She’s been paying with card the whole trip.

We tiptoe ashamedly in to the next room which takes us up a flight of stairs, then another, and another. Eventually we come out at the top where a balcony gives us an awesome panorama of the Bjelopavli?i plain. There’s a set of mosaics with religious figures in various poses and another room with another priest and another offering box. We take some photos, and push through the crush to get back downstairs. Grace buys a fridge magnet. Neno takes us home.

The next day we’re up early for a bus to Budva, the ‘touristy’ part of this trip. It’s a stereotypical European beach town – resorts crammed upon resorts all along the shoreline. The beach has been partitioned off into little sections for each resort, and the partitions are colour-coded – blue umbrellas for one, beige for the next, red for the third. To use the beach you have to pay a fee – 25 Euro for umbrellas closest to the sea, 20 for the ones a little farther up. I hate paying for things, so we find a rocky little section with no partition and join a throng of people embracing Earth’s natural beauty – gratis. The water is colder than Croatia, the shore is rocky and slippery, but it’s wet and we’re on a run of 14 days above thirty degrees so I’m loving it.

We head back to our hotel to search for the pool, which is on the listing and all the website photos. After twenty minutes of scouring all five floors, reception tells us there is no pool. The previous owner put it on the marketing to draw people in, but there has never been a pool here. I check the reviews online – hotel nice, but there’s no pool. Whoops. We get cans of Montenegro’s favourite local beer Nikši?ko and sit on the terrace to watch the sun go down.

We catch another bus from Budva to Kotor, driving past an ominous looking cloud of smoke. There’s been a bushfire raging in Montenegro for the last three days – spurred on by the intense heat. We can smell it from the road as we speed past, and I’m remembering the 2021 bushfires in Australia where we drove from Melbourne to Sydney to catch the NYE celebrations and drove directly through thick clouds of smoke on the freeway near Canberra.

No-one seems particularly worried about this fire, although every time we use Google Maps it pops up a Warning – Severe Fire notification. We pass over the hill and drive down to the ocean and the fire is a distant memory. I search online five days later to find the fire is still burning.

We check in to our accommodation and go for a walk through the Old Town of Kotor. As part of being a tourist in Montenegro you need to go to the Tourist Registration Office and pay a Euro for each day that you’re going to be in Montenegro. No-one has told us this yet, and we’ve been in the country for almost a week, but our Kotor Airbnb host assures us its required. He gives us a Google Maps location, but the streets of the old town are tight and Google Maps refuses to work. We walk maze-like, in big circles, past hundreds of gelato stands and souvenir shops. It’s a beautiful city, walled with giant stones and full of churches. It feels like Dubrovnik but without the grandeur. More lived-in, slightly less polished.

We dine at ‘City Restaurant’ which is amazing despite the name. I have the risotto and Grace has the fish banquet – the first of many sea-food dishes. She’s determined the eat the sea dry – fish soup, grilled squid, octopus salad, a baked bass. She balks at the oysters which are 4 euro each.

Our meal is soundtracked by an elderly gentleman who spends most of his time setting up. He’s brought two saxophones, a clarinet, a guitar, a set of bongoes and some assorted percussion, and it takes him almost an hour to get all the instruments out of their cases. I’m excited for the show, until he kicks off by playing ‘The Bare Necessities’ on clarinet over a MIDI backing track. His playing is good, but it just feels so cheesy. I could almost condone it until he spends a chorus just playing solo tambourine against the track. This shapes our musical experience all week – because it’s peak tourist season there’s so much music going on, a bunch of really great players, playing really lacklustre music. On the last night we find a Serbian quartet – two violins, double bass and bouzouki. They’re on tour from Belgrade, and start the set by playing a ripping tune in seven. It’s a great melody, awesome playing, and they’re really enjoying themselves. They follow it up with a really woeful 12 bar blues.

I liken to the Melbourne covers scene – there’s some really great players doing some really great things, but if you’re out on a Tuesday night wandering down Brunswick Street catching the buskers, it’s going to be a mixed bag of Vance Joy covers and Hendrix Covers and solo saxophone. It feels like a shame to be in a part of the world that has such a rich musical heritage and get the most watered-down touristy music, but maybe it’s a living, and maybe they’re enjoying it. Or maybe music is subjective and there’s room for kitsch. Ah well, onwards we go!